It was our mission to lead the Earthlings in a #provocation during #inquiry and to get them to think about what our Inquiry will be next term.

I wonder if you can guess what we might be inquiring about next term? What guiding question might we be exploring? What do you think you already know about it? What questions do you still have? WHAT DOES IT MAKE YOU WONDER???

Our mission was successful! One group identified the Essential Question and all students were great explorers and wonderers this morning! Bring on Term 2!!!

We love #inquiry @kjinquiry . Just where will our wonderings lead us next term???

Using the #gesture method, learning #French has proven to be an overwhelming success at St Bede's this year. Our language learning, as recorded by the SpeakUp App, has shown our students (and teachers) are learning at twice the rate as others learning another language in their first (and sometimes second and third) year!.

This learning was showcased last week at the Inaugural St Bede's French Festival. It was an impressive display of our learning and was so much fun for everyone involved.

Feedback was very complimentary and a big thank you to all the parents involved in helping to make our night the success it was.

The Fashion Parade, inspired by @JPGaultier was a huge success. The link below will lead you to the slideshow shown on the night. The students and parents were extremely dedicated- from design stages to production. We hope you enjoy our version of French haute couture, Gaultier style.

5/6N look forward to showcasing our learning on the 24th October @6pm!!! See you there 🙂

What are The Benefits of Being #Bilingual?

There has been a lot of research on bilingualism over the years. Many studies have found so many benefits of being bilingual or being able to speak more than one language. A trait that was once considered a hindrance, has now proved to have so many advantages for both children and adults.

Here are 10 amazing benefits of being bilingual:

1. Being #bilingual has positive effects on the brain

Studies show that being bilingual has many cognitive benefits. According to research, speaking a second language can mean that you have a better attention span and can multi-task better than monolinguals. This is because being bilingual means you are constantly switching from one language to the other. Numerous other studies suggest that bilingualism can also reduce the risk of having a stroke.

Cognitive benefits effect both bilingual kids and bilingual adults. Children as young as seven months who are exposed to more than one language tend to adjust better to changes in the environment. For older bilinguals, there tends to be less cognitive decline.

2. #Bilingualism gives you the educational advantage

Many of the cognitive benefits mentioned above can also mean that bilinguals have an advantage at school or further education. Many studies show that those who speak a second language are more likely to be less distracted and more focused on tasks.

Even bilingual children who are educated in their second language, have actually been seen to outperform monolingual students in their native language.

The recent Millennum Cohort Study found many educational benefits for bilingual children. Their research showed that even though children who are educated in their second language may initially lag behind around three, four and five years old, they soon catch up and outperform their peers by age seven.

3. Languages are highly valued in the workplace

Speaking a second language has numerous employment benefits. Being bilingual means that there are more job opportunities depending on which languages you speak. Communication in the workplace is important, and more companies, especially those with international offices, are considering bilingualism a high priority.

Fast growing fields such as tourism, journalism and translation put great value on bilingual employees. Additional languages on the resume could have your application moved to the top of the pile and give you a better chance at getting the job, even if you aren’t as qualified as another monolingual applicant.

4. Being #Bilingual has been linked to health benefits

There have been many studies proving that being bilingual can benefit ones health. Researches recently found that there is growing evidence to suggest that bilingualism can delay the onset of Dementia and Alzheimer’s disease for example. Other benefits of being bilingual include things such as a faster stroke recovery, lower stress levels, and delay many effects of old to name a few.

5. Speaking more than one language makes you more open minded

Have you ever heard the bilingual quote “To have another language is to possess a second soul” by Charlemagne? One of the benefits of being bilingual can mean that you see the world in different ways. Some even say that speaking two different languages can sometimes feel like having two different personalities.

Bilinguals are used to constant change. This means that they are usually less effected by changes in the environment, and more open minded to new things and new experiences, because they have more than one view of the world already.

6. Speaking a foreign language can be highly beneficial when you travel

Of course you can get around many countries without speaking the language. However, think of how much more you can experience if you speak the local language of the place you are visiting. No need for a phrase book or a translation app on the phone. Being able to communicate with the locals and immerse yourself in the language and culture can make your travel experience so much more enjoyable.

7. Being #Bilingual opens up new social opportunities

Bilinguals can make friends in more than one language meaning more opportunities to meet new people, and enjoy different hobbies and activities. Being able to communicate with people from other cultures is a huge social advantage and can open up so many more doors in life.

8. Knowing more than one language helps you to learn additional languages

An amazing benefit of being bilingual is that you can learn additional languages more easily that monolinguals. This is because language skills reinforce each other. So if you have learned a second language already, then learning a third means transferring those skills over.

9. Being #bilingual means you can raise #bilingual kids

What better advantage, than being able to pass on your languages to your own children so they can reap the benefits of being bilingual too! Give your children the best start in life and raise them bilingual from birth. Your bilingual kids can then have bilingual kids of their own and languages can be passed on through generations.

10. You are not the minority if you are #bilingual

One of the biggest misconceptions is that bilingualism is a rare phenomenon. But, in fact being bilingual means you are NOT the minority. More than half the world speaks more than one language on a daily basis. In many countries around the world, bilingualism is actually considered the norm, and I’m sure it won’t be long until the rest of the world catches on. Everyone should have the chance to learn a second language and reap the benefits of being bilingual.

Preparations are well underway to showcase our #French #learning at next term's St Bede's French Expo. Everyone at school was busy in their groups cooking, painting, researching and creating.

The students in Ms Richardson's Group, under the creative genius of Desia, Lisa, Jan, Kylie and Kay, put their talents into action, designing and constructing @JPGaultier inspired Fashion.

With the chosen themes of food and sport at the forefront of our designs, the inspired sketches have begun to take shape. We can't wait for our next workshop day to finalise our outfits. Then we need to write about them for our Fashion Parade on the big night. All in French of course!

A very impressive effort after only 6 months of learning French!!! Can't wait to see you on the 24th October from 6-8pm! Au Revoir et a bientot!

Last term we rose to the challenge to collect the most money for our first ever St Bede's Silver Coin Challenge. And what a great success it was. Our class alone raised over $600!

As a reward for our great effort (and strategy!) we chose our prize - a sausage sizzle... which also turned into a free dress day, a class party AND an afternoon movie! We know how to negotiate!

And then the mums from the PA spoiled us even further - a cake decorated to look just like our 20c coin! Amazing and decadent! What an incredible conclusion to an incredible day. Well done us and a big thanks to the mums for treating us to an awesome celebration!

I discovered this article by Holly Korbey and thought it contained important messages for us all.Read to and Read Aloud are reading strategies usually used and observed in the junior grades but, as this article highlights, it needs to continue throughout the upper years of schooling and beyond! As adults, we can enjoy listening to texts via podcasts as we drive!!!

I hope you enjoy the article and remember... always keep reading 🙂

Educator and author Jessica Lahey reads Shakespeare and Dickens aloud to her seventh- and eighth-graders, complete with all the voices. Her students love being read to, and sometimes get so carried away with the story, she allows them to lie on the floor and close their eyes just to listen and enjoy it. Lahey reads short stories aloud, too: “My favorite story to read out loud has to be Poe’s ‘Tell-tale Heart.’ I heighten the tension and get a little nuts-o as the narrator starts to really go off the rails. So much fun.”

While reading Dickens aloud helps students get used to his Victorian literary style, Lahey said that it’s also an opportunity for her to stop and explain rhetorical and literary devices they wouldn’t get on their own. And they read the Bard’s plays together, divvying up the parts, because “that’s how they are meant to be experienced.”

“Shared words have power, an energy that you can’t get from TV, radio, or online.”

Reading aloud to older children — even up to age 14, who can comfortably read to themselves — has benefits both academic and emotional, says Jim Trelease, who could easily be called King of the Read-Aloud. Trelease, a Boston-based journalist, turned his passion for reading aloud to his children into The Read-Aloud Handbook in 1979; it has since been an unequivocal bestseller with sales in the mult-millions, and Trelease is releasing the seventh, and final, edition in June.

Obviously, Trelease firmly believes in the value of reading to kids of all ages.

“The first reason to read aloud to older kids is to consider the fact that a child’s reading level doesn’t catch up to his listening level until about the eighth grade,” said Trelease, referring to a 1984 study performed by Dr. Thomas G. Sticht showing that kids can understand books that are too hard to decode themselves if they are read aloud. “You have to hear it before you can speak it, and you have to speak it before you can read it. Reading at this level happens through the ear.”

Research collected on middle school read-alouds showed that 58 percent of teachers read aloud to their students – and nearly 100 percent of reading and special education teachers. And, while middle-school students reported liking read-alouds, little data has been collected on the “extent and nature” of reading aloud to twelve- to fourteen-year-olds.

“Research indicates that motivation, interest, and engagement are often enhanced when teachers read aloud to middle school students,” wrote research authors Lettie K. Albright and Mary Ariail. Teachers surveyed for the study cited modeling as their number-one reason for reading aloud.

Trelease acknowledged that modelling the pleasure of reading is important, but there are more reasons read-alouds work so well — like “broadening the menu.”

“Let’s take a nine-year-old who’s just finished two solid years of drill and skill, a lot of testing, a lot of work, and they’re competent, but they’re thinking in terms of reading as a sweat experience,” he said. When a teacher reads a good book above student reading level, he show students that the good stuff — the really great books — are coming down the road, if they stick with it.

“Broadening the menu” becomes even more important if a child has difficulties with reading. According to Wandering Eductators’ Dr. Jessica Voigts, who homeschools her daughter Lillie, reading aloud can make reading more pleasurable for someone with dyslexia. “Reading together – with her watching the words as I read, and then her reading to me – is a way to be together, to experience the world, to enjoy a common pleasure. I read to her, about two-thirds of the time, and then she takes over for one-third of the time. We pass the book back and forth, although we’re usually right next to each other,” she said.

And though her daughter struggles, Voigt admitted she reads to Lillie for more than just academic benefits. “This is a time — tweens, teens — when life is full of craziness. This is one way to have a place of rest, of being, something to count on each day. Shared words have power, an energy that you can’t get from TV, radio, or online,” she said.

For Trelease, the power of shared words is a big reason to keep on reading aloud after children are able to read for themselves. Students might interject questions, comfortably wading into complicated or difficult subjects because they are happening to the characters in the story, and not to themselves. “Why do you think so many children’s stories have orphans as characters? Because every child either worries or fantasizes about being orphaned.”

While Trelease maintained that read-alouds can happen through any device (“Look at all the truckers listening to books on CD,” he said), and Lahey reads from a physical paper book, dogeared and scrawled with all her notes in the margins, both emphasized how students recall read-alouds with fond memories. Trelease recently received a letter from a retired teacher who reconnected online with former students some 30 years later. She wanted to know the one thing her former students remembered about her class.